


The Beast In Me

by Balder12



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Episode Tag, Gen, Possession, s09e01 I Think I'm Going to Like It Here
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-10-10
Updated: 2013-10-10
Packaged: 2017-12-28 23:27:32
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 508
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/998171
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Balder12/pseuds/Balder12
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sam is happy.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Beast In Me

**Author's Note:**

> Coda for Episode 9.01. Spoilers for that episode.

Sam is happy. In the days after Dean pulls him away from the church he assumes it’s the natural joy of good health after a long sickness. He takes an apple from the refrigerator and every crisp bite of cold sweetness is as wonderful as if it’s the first apple he’s ever eaten. He peels tangerines just to smell the perfume of their skin. He enjoys the simple pleasure of stretching his limbs lazily against the sheets when he wakes up in the morning and savors the bright sting of a hot shower.

But it’s more than that. There’s been a hollow, hungry place in the center of Sam’s chest for as long as he can remember, and now it’s warm and full. He overflows with love for Dean and Kevin and Charlie. He loves the people he stands in line with at the grocery store. He sees the beauty of their fragile humanity and feels both profoundly connected to them and set apart, as if he’s meant to watch over them.

Sometimes Sam has strange thoughts. He’s always hated red wine—even the smell of it makes his head hurt—but when he walks by a bottle in the bunker’s pantry he’s possessed by a sudden craving and opens it. He appreciates every subtle note of cherry, leather, and chocolate, even though he knows nothing about wine. He drinks three glasses but no headache follows.

One morning he’s standing in the kitchen with Dean, sipping his coffee and discussing a wendigo, when he finds himself fascinated by the lamplight reflected in Dean’s eyelashes. He runs the pads of his fingers across Dean’s face, gently exploring the soft flesh of his eyelids and the prickle of his roughly shaven cheek.

“Um, Sammy, you okay there?” Dean looks worried and inexplicably guilty. Sam pulls his hand away from Dean’s face and feels bad for upsetting him. Of course he’s okay. He’s never been more okay in his life.

In his dreams Sam flies across the silent vacuum of space on wings as soft as smoke and as sharp as razors. His feathers gleam dully in the light of alien suns. He is vast as mountain ranges, but his many limbs fold neatly inside their cradle of bone when he finds his rest.

Sam wakes every night at 3am in a cold sweat. He has cancer. He can feel it eating its way through his marrow and up into his brain, gradually replacing him with itself. No, not cancer. He knows the white hot grub that’s living in his chest. He’s felt it there before. Lucifer. He needs to get up, he needs to fight, he needs to tell Dean.

But then a voice murmurs from the depths of his mind that he’s healthy, that Lucifer is in the Cage, that all is well and he should go back to sleep. For a moment he struggles against its sticky-sweet entanglement, but then he surrenders and slips back under its spell.

Sam is happy. Or at least someone inside him is.


End file.
